“Satya Nadella, Microsoft’s chief executive, has written a company manifesto of sorts,” Nick Wingfield reports for The New York Times. “His 3,100-word essay, distributed by email to Microsoft employees Thursday morning, is Mr. Nadella’s mission statement and a rallying cry for the staff. Although it contained few specifics, the essay appeared to lay the groundwork for significant changes, to be announced this month.”

“Mr. Nadella said everyone at Microsoft must find ways to simplify and work faster and more efficiently. ‘We will increase the fluidity of information and ideas by taking actions to flatten the organization and develop leaner business processes,’ he wrote. ‘Culture change means we will do things differently,'” Wingfield reports. “Those words seemed to hint at the possibility of layoffs. In most years, around the end of Microsoft’s fiscal year on June 30, rumors swirl among employees about cutbacks in different groups as the company defines its plans for the next 12 months.”

S.S. Microtanic Captain Satya Nadella

“When job reductions occur, though, they are rarely big enough to meaningfully affect Microsoft’s overall head count, which was close to 100,000 at the end of June 2013,” Wingfield reports. “This year, however, the layoff rumor mill has been especially active. That is partly because Microsoft added 25,000 new employees at the end of April with the completion of its acquisition of Nokia’s mobile division.”

“Mr. Nadella said in his email that, throughout July, senior executives would reveal “more on the engineering and organization changes we believe are needed.” He said he would discuss changes more when the company released its earnings on July 22,” Wingfield reports. “Mr. Nadella said Microsoft was ‘the productivity and platform company for the mobile-first and cloud-first world… We will reinvent productivity to empower every person and every organization on the planet to do more and achieve more.'”

Nadella, who might be nearly as clueless as Ballmer, also found the need to drop the word “empower” seven times during his expulsion. That would, of course, be seven times too many. How many sentences into this interminable crapfest did it take for the average Microsoftie to get that sick feeling in the pit of their stomach prompting them to pull up their resume for updating? This is what happens when a company that desperately needed new direction from new blood instead stupidly and cowardly hires from within (not that is wasn’t too late already regardless).

> Mr. Nadella said Microsoft was ‘the productivity and platform company for the mobile-first and cloud-first world…

This time, it’s the “mobile-first and cloud-first” campaign, which is exactly what Microsoft’s core Windows customers do NOT want. They just want a NEW version of Windows that respects users who you use a “PC” (desktop/laptop) that has a keyboard and mouse (and a local drive for storage), and no screen touching.

Ironically, Windows users will feel more “at home” using the a Mac than the latest version of Windows. A fact that they are realizing more and more. This is why Apple has growing Mac sales amid an overall PC industry that is stagnant or in decline. Apple has a HUGE pool of potential new Mac customers called “alienated Windows users.”

Hellooo, James Cameron! Forget about making that sequel to Avatar! Your next blockbuster has got to be Titanic II. The vessel is listing to starboard, the deck chairs are skittering around, and the band stumbles but plays on. Titanic II is sinking from the excessive weight of the ironically named Surfaces being used as ballast. Still got those waterproof cameras?

We shouldn’t forget that M$ still has the world’s biggest cash cow in Windows and Office. For them it is a blessing and a curse. A blessing since it has enabled them to play around with other products and a curse because the security of guaranteed revenue means there is no drive to make good and innovative products that will succeed.
Apple’s acquisitions are designed to add to the company’s skill set. M$ are designed to make them look good. Apple moves forward, M$ sideways or backwards.
If I were in Satya’s shoes I probably wouldn’t know what to do either. When Jobs came back to Apple he knew exactly how to fix Apple but it took guts to cut revenue generating products. I don’t think anyone at M$ can do that.

MS bought $150M in nonvoting stock (which they unloaded a few years later) and publicly announced that they would continue to offer Office for the Mac (and so avoid getting sued for stealing and using Apple IP).

The day before the announcement Apple had a market cap of $2.46 billion, and ended the previous quarter with revenues of $1.7 billion and cash reserves of US$1.2 billion. The $150M deal was purely symbolic; it wasn’t needed to “keep Apple from sinking”.

Let’s not be too cocky MDN. Apple still has a long way to go to make it’s cloud offerings up to the standards Apple customers expect. I’m hoping that Apple and Microsoft can find a way to work together to the detriment to Google, Adobe and Oracle going forward.